In odontology posts are known to be used in metal or a composite material to reconstruct a root treated tooth.
These posts, of whatever material they are made, have a circular cross-section which means that when they are placed in dental root canals whose cross-section is of a different shape, only a small part of their outer surface comes into contact with the inner wall of the tooth. Mechanical locking of the post is therefore not fully effective, and it is sometimes necessary to improve the lock by inserting various reconstruction or cementing products into the free spaces between the tooth and the post.
If the practitioner wishes to achieve a perfect fit of the post inside an ovoid root canal, a very precise root canal impression has to be made for example in silicon which is forwarded to a prosthesis laboratory to have a so-called anatoform post made of cast metal, which has the disadvantage of being costly and requires three successive procedures which can be a source of imprecision, these being taking an impression of high accuracy, making a wax post in this impression and finally casting the metal post with the risk of over-sizing at the time of casting.
Patent FR-A-2 669 211 proposed filling the spaces between the post and the root canal with an injection of setting resin which also bonds the post to the canal. One disadvantage of this technique is that the extent of shrinkage which takes place in the resin during setting increases with the mass of resin. Under these conditions the shrinkage which occurs in different places within the root canal can be extensive and creates areas in which bonding is not satisfactory.
Document DE-A-3 825 601 also describes a dental post whose upper end is provided with a part of truncated cone shape forming a core of greater diameter intended to reconstruct a deteriorated tooth. This dental post is positioned in the root canal of the tooth and is made up of a synthetic product containing fibres which may be carbon or glass fibres. This type of post is fixed in the root canal of the tooth by bonding or cementing means. Such device has drawbacks similar to those described in the document mentioned previously.
The purpose of the present invention is to remedy such drawbacks. This invention therefore sets out to improve both the ease and quality of applying reinforcements to a dental cavity. One particular purpose of the present invention is to propose a dental reinforcement which is able to fit the contour of the cavity, or root canal, in which it is to be positioned.